Jamaican Squads Too Strong On Final Day At Penn Despite Valiant Efforts For Bullis; IMG Academy FL Wins 4x800

By Oliver Hinson for DyeStat

John Nepolitan photos

PHILADELPHIA — Hydel JAM capped off the 129th running of the Penn Relays with a Penn Relays record in the girls 4x400 relay Championship of America, bringing the Franklin Field crowd to its feet.

The Jamaican powerhouse finished in 3:30.42, taking home its fourth wheel in as many years.

“It feels amazing,” third leg Sashana Johnson said, “because we are the best. We came out here to compete.”

Bullis MD was the top American team in second overall, mirroring the boys’ finish from Friday night. They didn’t come as close to upsetting the Jamaicans as Quincy Wilson and his crew did, but they still set a new US#1 time of 3:33.30.

That peformance is No. 3 in U.S. prep history and the second-fastest in Bullis history.

For many of the Bullis girls, the 4x400 final was their last Penn Relays race ever. The Bulldogs have been a fixture at this meet for years, so the emotions were high for seniors Sydney Sutton and Tatum Lynn.

“(The Penn Relays) has meant a lot because of the atmosphere," Sutton said. “You get to see people of all different cultures and combine… it’s just a very meaningful experience to me, and I’m just sad to see it go.”

The Bullis girls also secured the top American finish in the girls 4x100 relay Championship of America, taking third in 44.99. The Edwin Allen girls won that race, clinching their first 4x100 title since 2022.

“Coming off of not (winning) for the last two years,” Edwin Allen’s Jounee Armstrong said, “this is really, really a big one.”

Armstrong said “vengeance, hunger, focus” were all on the mind after the disappointments her squad faced in the previous years; they took second to Hydel last year, and in 2023, they were disqualified.

Bullis’s sub-45 mark was only four hundredths off their US#4 time from the Florida Relays in early April, and they recorded this mark in the rain. Junior Kassidy Hopkins said they didn’t let the downpour faze them. 

“We don’t really care about the rain because we’ve faced a lot more adversity,” Hopkins said. “Coming out here, we just wanted to run as strong as possible and get the job done.”

IMG Academy FL kept the girls 4x800 meter title in America for the third year in a row, beating a trio of Jamaican teams in a race that wasn’t particularly close. A third leg of 2:12.32 put them in first place at the last handoff, and they ended up beating runner-up Alphansus Davis by nearly six seconds.

Sophomore Anyla Robinson said the atmosphere of the meet was a big factor in helping her performance.

“The crowd, the emotions, the bells, everything,” Robinson said. “It just literally pushed me to go faster.”